Misogyny a ‘Hate Crime’?

When I read the online article in The Guardian on 13/07 ‘Is wolf-whistling at women set to become a hate crime’ following the press release by Nottinghamshire Police I was strongly supportive of the force’s approach. I was also rather disappointed that only one force out of 43 Home Office Police Forces in England & Wales has taken this step. No sooner had the article gone out, the comments began to flow in that trivialised it. There are a considerable number of comments, many which have been taken down by the Guardian. There were some supportive comments, but unfortunately, the article’s title distracted from a very serious issue. As a result there were many negative comments. Twitter came alight and an example of yet another middle class male in a position of authority and power demeaning the issue was Denis Fuller (@FullerDennis). Mr. Fuller, or Councillor Fuller sits as a County Councillor in Surrey, is a chartered accountant/business advisor, a Rotarian and charity volunteer who loves cricket. His views were. in my opinion, and others when I read some of the replies, clearly set in the 1970s. He believed there was no problem with a 15 year old girl being whistled at by men on her way to school. I will let you read the feed to see how he defends the indefensible.

The following day, I was listening to the Jeremy Vine show on BBC Radio 2. There are usually a few topics discussed, with on being somewhat ‘tongue in cheek’. Fortunately, the topic on misogyny was not that topic. There were two main speakers, a younger woman who ran a website and a more mature woman. The debate was however trivialised by a focus on ‘wolf-whistling’ and comments. The younger woman stated that she was occasionally subject to this type of behaviour and  she was not concerned as she either shrugged them off, made comment back or even smiled about it. The other woman suggested that not all women were as able to cope as the other speaker. Jeremy Vine latched on to the fact that it made her smile, “How do men know where to draw the line? What is acceptable or not?”

Here lies the main problem; men are always in the position of power, despite the UK having a female Monarch, a female Prime Minister and a female First Minister in Scotland. The comments made in the Guardian article, Twitter, the Jeremy Vine show not taking the topic seriously and the younger woman laughing this behaviour off, shows that we have not changed as a society. Some women clearly see it as part of daily life, others do not see any problem. The fact that we are making misogynistic behaviour a hate crime is worrying. What was more concerning was that the following day, Nottinghamshire’s Chief Constable Sue Fish released another statement reiterating support for the policy as there had been so much coverage of the ‘wolf-whistling’ aspect.

The other side to this, is whilst Chief Constable Sue Fish clearly believes and supports the measure, will women believe that they will truly get the response they need if they report such matters? Policing is male dominated and still has a macho culture. Women and some men who join the service still often face a tough decisions of either fitting in to that culture or leaving. There is still the problem that if a woman is friendly, then she is flirting and a potential target for predatory men. There is still the glass ceiling where women in the service to be equal to their male colleagues, have to be so much better. If women are given specialist roles or receive promotion, there are still the whispers from male colleagues that it is only because she is a woman, and clearly not on merit.

Whilst I fully support Nottinghamshire’s approach and truly hope that the other 42 forces plus BTP and the CNC take the same approach, I believe that forces need to do more to support their female colleagues, be they police officers or police staff. We have seen many recent examples of male officers being dismissed for acting inappropriately with female colleagues or members of the public. At the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), an ex-Senior Detective, Martin Kay, turned lecturer pleaded guilty to harassment of a student and it was later revealed that he had been involved in this type of behaviour whilst serving. It had been ‘brushed under the carpet’, leaving a female colleague with nowhere to go and feeling unsupported. In another recent case, Nick Gargan, the now retired Chief Constable of Avon & Somerset and former Head of the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA), now the College of Policing was suspended by his PCC and later resigned over 8 counts of misconduct relating to unwanted behaviour towards female colleagues. Please don’t worry about Nick, as he has not been sacked, so doesn’t lose his pension and has managed to get a very nice senior position working for G4S.

The power clearly still lies with men, in business and public service. The police service needs to take a look at its own culture of misogyny to improve the working lives and conditions of its female employees. Only when we drive out this type of behaviour and get rid of the whispers about female colleagues, will the service truly begin to support victims of misogynistic hate crime.

m.holleran

Senior Lecturer in Policing Studies at York St John. Launched 3 Policing related degree programmes in September 2017. Preparing the University for the College of Policing's Police Education Qualifications Framework (PEQF). Over 30yrs in the police service working on the frontline, safer neighbourhoods and training/education. Developed and supported a number of national training initiatives around pre-join programmes. Interests in police organisational culture, gender issues and the study of inter-personal violence (domestic abuse).

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